Food Metaphors
by Chachiri NoDa
Summary: Milkshake Fic. Don't know the Milkshake Grouping? Read and find out. Bunta attempts to explain it.


Warnings: None, but you may not look at a milkshake the same way again.  
Note: Inspired by RPG chats. "Cocoa-chan" is my invention and so is "Berry Bun." Please don't use either without my permission, okay?

Jackel knew that the nickname "Cocoa-chan" was a racial slur. He knew it sounded like one to moment he first heard it, and the fact his mother nearly flipped a gasket when Bunta left a message for "Cocoa-chan" on his answering machine, that most people were going to take it that way. It wasn't like he could defend Bunta's honor by explaining to his mother that he had called Bunta "Berry Bun" first.

Because that hadn't happened. Honest.

But Jackel knew that the nickname had never been intended to be a slur of any kind. It was invented with the aid of Bunta's sweet-tooth and Jackel's name-calling first, after all. It didn't bother him any. But people kept sending Bunta dirty looks whenever he used it, and he didn't want people thinking bad things about his pink-haired boyfriend, so he decided that he was going to have to make Bunta stop using it.

But every time it occurred to him to say something, Bunta had managed to distract him. Take now for example:

"You've made a mess, Berry Bun," Jackel pointed out. "And it's getting on the floor now."

"Quiet, Cocoa-chan," Bunta said as he crawled under the table to reclaim the spoon that had suicided off the edge to avoid further torment. Bunta tossed the spoon so it could drown in some dirty dish water as he fished for a replacement from a draw.

"That ice cream is melting," Jackel mentioned as he stepped closer to the table. Bunta making a mess was rather interesting, since Bunta was so familiar with the kitchen that they rarely happened. "But the blender looks like it's going to pull through just fine."

Bunta had jumped at the sound of Jackel first entering the room, like a child caught in the cookie jar. It had been enough for him to knock the blender off the table, though to Bunta's merit, he had caught it before it struck the floor. It was sad that most of his concoction was all over one of the dining chairs and was dripping down a leg to puddle on the floor.

Bunta had spent a moment looking down at the mess before going back to work with replicating the drink he had been working on. Jackel took that as a sign that he was supposed to clean it up and proceeded to do so. Bunta had just relocated the jar of cherries when Jackel tossed the dirty paper towels in the trash.

"What are you doing anyway?" Jackel asked, watching and Bunta dipped his spoon in a close of warm water before attacking the ice cream again.

"Making milkshakes, Cocoa-chan," Bunta explained. "Jiroh was asking for one yesterday and we were out of milk."

Bunta was mouthing something as he dumped a large portion of chocolate ice cream into the blender. Jackel watched Bunta's lips for a moment for asking him to repeat.

"I said this part is you," Bunta said, once satisfied with the amount of ice cream on the blender. "You're the chocolate part."

Jackel paused and thought how his mother would have responded to that one before Bunta explained himself, "Because chocolate can be rich and bitter. You have a rich laugh when you use it, but can be rather bitter at times."

Jackel blinked and nodded slowly. He mouth twitched into a small smile. "Am I now?"

"Yep," Bunta confirmed, a little absently. "And the milk is Jiroh. Because milk is smooth and makes me sleepy. Jiroh always reminds me of sleep, and he can be rather smooth when he's tricking Kiri into fetching the remote."

Bunta poured some milk into the blender, before capping the container and putting it back into the fridge. He picked up a bowl and started to push some crushed up cookies into the blender. "Guess who this part is?"

"Kirihara, I guess," Jackel said, amused with the way Bunta's tongue darted to the corner of his lip as he tried to pour in the cookies without getting any of them on the table. "Tell me why?"

"Because they're both rough and sweet," Bunta explained. "Kiri's so easy to brush the wrong way, so people normally only see the rough part, but Kiri goes out of his way sometimes. He's always the one who puts a blanket over Jiroh when he falls asleep on the couch, and he lets me have my way a lot of the time when he doesn't have to."

"And what part are you?" Jackel asked as Bunta turned on the blender. There was a pause as it was too loud to talk properly, and Jackel repeated the question.

"I'm the whipped cream," Bunta said as he split the milkshake into a couple of glasses, intending to share with Jackel now that he was home.

When Jackel snickered, Bunta shot him a look, "And not because I'm whipped, damnit."

Bunta carefully spooned whipped cream on top of each milkshake, twirling the spoon in it to give it a bit of shape, "It's because I'm sweet and fluffy."

"And barely there," Jackel added and Bunta made to fling the spoon at his head.

Bunta turned and added a cherry to both and pushed one toward Jackel. Jackel handed him a straw and took a sip from his milkshake. "Good, and that was the sappiest thing I've ever heard."

Bunta stuck out his tongue, having attended the Niou School of Proper Etiquette. "Don't laugh at me because I'm sentimental."

Jackel kissed Bunta's cheek before raising an eyebrow. "And the cherry? What's it for?"

Bunta smirked and sent him a leer, "It's a _cherry_, Cocoa-chan. What do you _think_ it stands for?"

"No clue," Jackel said with a serious face as he stole the cherry off Bunta's milkshake.

Bunta blinked before saying with an equally straight face, "You stole my cherry."

Jackel nodded and went back to his own milkshake with a grin, "For the second time now."


End file.
